Beautiful poem of sorrow....accompanied by an empty coffee cup and burnt out cigarette...the symbols of loneliness, emotional fatigue, forfeiture, sadness....such a melancholy state of affairs. Beautiful, Awesome UP

Do you know strange fruit? Stunningly sad and moving song. Not for the faint hearted.

Ian

x

Sunnie Day 5 years ago

I will have to go listen..Thanks Ian..Have a good night..

franciaonline 5 years ago from Philippines

Wow, what a beautiful poem!

Rosemay50 5 years ago from Hawkes Bay - NewZealand

Exquisite poem and imagery. Beautiful but very sad.

saddlerider1 5 years ago

The things that bring memories to mind, sad though beautiful memories of what we once had, shared and loved together. Loneliness in a room, smoking and drinking ate at my soul as old Jack tasted bitterly good to soothe what I had lost or didn't have with me in that dim of my lonely room.

My heart ached for her and I cried alone, so very alone. My soul empty, my heart aching, the stench of loss so prominent. Oh the blues of Billie always haunts my poet's soul....Loved your work, it moved me.....

This has the essence of so many bittersweet shards of life remembered and strangely enjoyed in that melancholia bordering on self-pity and a kind of delight at having been there, done that - and survived.

Your words are chosen like jewels and set into their piece of jewelry with the precision and artistic impulses of a great jeweler, not a mismatch or a nanometer off perfection. I really am awed by your grace in writing. You must not hide it under any barrels!

I love "These Foolish Things" - part of my own personal memory trove - and with Billy Holliday singing it - just exactly right for this poem, down to the tinkling piano in the background.

Again - my excuse for tardiness is that I wasn't notified - but how glad I am that I came in search of an Ian-fix!

acaetnna 5 years ago from Guildford

Beautifully written and very powerful. Your work certainly brought a few tears to my eyes. So very sad, to be so lonely and lose the one you love. Perfect imagery. Voting up and pressing those buttons.

Nellie, you are so kind. I am beginning to see where my strengths lie, when I read your comments, and I think that it is time I wrote some more. I also love, as I said to Becky, melancholia and I also love the feel of gentle decadence, so I'm going to get a pack of writing crayons (We're not allowed to have sharp implements here; Nurse Smythe says that sometimes we get a bit excited) and I'm going to try and whack out some more stuff!!!

What I so love about your work is its ability to arouse all the emotions including the "dark" ones, but somehow to leave one feeling the better for it. That is most rare. We might learn to attune ourselves out of the pits of despair into which some writings would otherwise plunge us, leaving us to falter and flail down there, but so few can take us on a guided tour and bring us safely back to the surface afterward, still aware and affected by the journey, but not bruised and battered by it. Perhaps it's due to your own buoyancy.

Whatever it is, you must indulge your writing tools to explore every nook and crayonny and poke into the bistros and boudoirs (or wherever one finds decadence that's gentle, not trite) to bring to light. Think how engrossed Nurse Smythe will get in it ,- giving you the more moments of freedom from her all-seeing eyes!

Nellieanna 5 years ago from TEXAS

PS - I just today (Saturday) received the email notifications of your latest hubs! I won't put my trust in that any more!! The hubs have been out for days already! Hrmph!

Oh - and by the way - I watched "Australia" (again) today. I end up crying. That precious little half-aboriginal boy is just so adorable.

Your first comment today is possibly one of the best bits of writing I have read for a very long time. It was deep, it was funny, it was elegant, it was everything I aspire to and more.

I laughed, I smiled (They are different, you know) I felt all sorts of emotion. it was lovely.

Bless you, my dear friend, I cannot believe how lucky I am to have have met you... we all, on Hub Pages, are.

And a little bit more enws:

The story ('The Potter') which I have been unable to write for so many months, started again, and I wrote about 300 words last night. That is a lot for me, so I hope I have been kick started and I can finish it.

Nellieanna 5 years ago from TEXAS

Thank you for such a lovely accolade. See how you inspire me!?

I know "The Potter" will be great. With a title like that, it's already half-way there. (My two dearest friends in the world when I needed them desperately, & who recognized my poetry as poetry, were potters by profession and dedication.)

If you hear a scream of anguish, it will be me. I am having so much trouble with my phone. I just can't get e-mail connection or even get a simple picture through to facebook. It keeps on telling me to re-boot... I'll give it a genuine boot. Right through the window.

Rebekah, I thank you for your elegant comment. It really inspires me. "Melancholy feeds the soul, it is part of life's emotional landscape. Without it, we forget how to feel." If you see that used in one of my hubs, donlt be angry, please. It encapsulates how I feel.

I've had many glitches with HP today. In fact for several days, it will NOT remember my sign-in info, though I check the box "remember me". Each time I click it up, though I've been online the whole time, it requires me to re-sign in. Or even more frustrating it may let me move ahead normally and then suddenly revert to asking for my ID again. Then it's been flakey about bringing up pages, as well. I think it's them, not my computer. Other things are behaving normally. Of course my computer tends to be touchy in flipping from where I'm typing to somewhere else. Repeatedly I must find it and start over again, and am sort of used to it and expecting it. I've mentioned that I usually compose offline and copy and paste, so all will not be gobbled up and lost. It's in emails and elsewhere, too. But then if I edit on the actual online place, it may just jump away and lose the new stuff. Sometimes I am philosophical about it and think that was 'meant to be' lost.

I think my long online history has inured me to such occurrences. I've had to start over with entire webpages when the timing elapsed without warning, for instance. But the business of the loss of ID is a different kind of kink.

I shll send the first bit of 'The Potter' tomorrow. It is only 1:25 but suddenly I am very tired and I have a feeling that RLS is about to bite, and I'll have to get a packet of Persil to scatter in my bed (only joking, but I am very tired for some reason).

Good night.

Hugs

Angie Jardine 5 years ago from Cornwall, land of the eternally youthful mind ...

Really? Pulses and prints? Okay ... sounds fascinating. I will send you a possible cure for RLS via back office mail - I've just got to dig it out of the cupboard when I've finished morning mail time.

And HP is being a complete arse with me too ... having to log in all the time ... pages not loading etc ... it is definitely them, guys.

Lettice had a bout of RLS once, but Maude wouldn't countenance any of that nonsense. Maude has a very proactive attitude to "maladies of the mind" as she likes to call all troubles to which the Girls are prone.

So she sent Lettice up onto the roof of the West Wing, maintaining that Ghastly Prendy was up there; preparing to throw down a few square yards if slates, as is her wont.

So Lettice, remembering the battle Cry of the Rogers-Allbodys, ("Bugger You Jack, I'm First in Line"), scaled the ladder and gained access to the roof. The door was locked after her (Maude's doing) and Lettice found herself on the roof, not with Ghastly Prendy, who happened to be sleeping with Raj's Black Orpingtons that evening, and in fact, most of that week, but with Mrs Orme-Wilde.

Mrs Orme-Wilde wasn’t wearing her best false teeth, but it was a full moon, and the wind was from the South. Poor Lettice found her way down eventually, perhaps she jumped, one will never know. But the poor dear was somewhat the worse for wear, badly mauled, but apparently completely over her RLS.

Hasn’t reoccurred since.

Angie Jardine 5 years ago from Cornwall, land of the eternally youthful mind ...

Wonderful ... so now you know what to do, our kid!

Nikkij504gurl 5 years ago from Louisiana

I've lost a few loved ones, to death and other. and to lose someone is always such a hard thing to go through and get over, but as for the deceased, you will meet again, hopefully, one day. So yes wait with a smile as mckbirds said. Save those tears for a happy reunion. Beautiful poem. like i said, i love when you write poems. They always come out so eloquently.

Thank you, Nicki for those well chosen and heartfelt words. You are rigth, Mike always seems to see into the heart of what I write... as you have here. also.

Thank you. again.

Nellieanna 5 years ago from TEXAS

Ah, Ian, dear heart. Hope you're rested up or resting up, sans RLS.

In an odd way, Angie - it's good to know it is not "just me" having these glitches! :) One wouldn't think it would be good that they're wide-spread, though, except that it's their responsibility to fix - hopefully!

Maybe, Angie and Nellie, it would be easier for them to fix if it were constant. I can spend ages on the confuser and it all works well, and then it "signs me out" or makes two identical comments... Don't blame the HP team. Blame the e-gremlins.

steve of ian fame 5 years ago from Essex

Coffee and cigarettes were a big part of your life at one stage and you left them for better things. Now your teacherism, a form of received behaviour too dominates your personality. How many spelling errors and grammatical errors can you find on this page? Life is meaningless without these precious things.

Nellie, Nellie, Nellie. 'The Potter' now has 27,993 words. I went on the Common today and edited the last three bits I had written, and still it goeth on. Keep your fingers crossed for me that I don;t come up against any more brick walls. The last writer's block (writers' block) took too long to be unblocked.

Talking of which, I wonder what happened to the 'Drano' competition. No one notified me.

Thank you, Jami. I appreciate your visit, and thanks for the votes, and comment.

Billie Holiday was amazing, wasn't she?

jami l. pereira 5 years ago

I used to have all of her albums , i bought them from columbia house , i never thought that i would find them , nice thing about them is all you have to do is call them up and ask , they had 6 of her albums and i bought them all :) then i got a divorce and he took them ... I dont think i miss anything he took except for those albums :( she was awesome! Loved your Hub ! have a great day!)

Have you seen the movie, 'Lady Sings the Blues', the story of Billie? I have not seen it, but apparently it is a really sensitive portrayal of the woman.

Storytellersrus 5 years ago from Stepping past clutter

TL, Lady Sings the Blues is a moving picture. I hadn't thought of it in years. I hadn't thought of melancholy over a woman either. In my case it would have been over a French man, a Grand Marnier and a Cowboy Singing the Blues.

Only I have never quite connected with the Blues being blue. Blue is a color of calm awakening, of energetic afternoons, of tempestuous seas, of antioxident berries. Not melancholy like smoke gray, a color of transition. To me it is the transition's uncertainty that inflicts melancholy; I will never love again; there will never be another romantic like this one particular unique in all the world man who has left me alone with my Grand Marnier and this Cowboy Singing the Blues.